Capitalization: Embrace Your Shift Key

 

Capitalization Epiphany

Don’t treat your Shift key like it’s radioactive, but don’t scatter capital letters willy-nilly, either. The following rules will help you know when—and when not—to capitalize.

Obviously, a sentence should start with a capital letter; unless it’s enfolded in the arms of a bigger sentence, that is:

• Lacking a harpoon (there were none in the car), we had to make do with a knitting needle duct-taped to a hockey stick.

Even enclosed in parentheses, a sentence on its own needs a capital letter:

• Giant squids are slippery. (That’s why we needed the harpoon.)

The same is true of a sentence in quotation marks, even if it’s snuggled inside another sentence:

• A passing driver pulled over and said, “Call me Ishmael.”

But you don’t need a capital letter for a snuggled sentence that doesn’t take quotes:

• The question was, did it eat terriers?

Capitalization After Colons

A colon should be followed by a capital letter…sometimes. Capitalize when the colon introduces more than one sentence:

• His dilemma was unbearable: If he left the car, he’d be mauled by bears. If he stayed inside, all the ice cream would soon be gone.

But use lower case for everything else (with the exception of quoted sentences):

• Only one thing could calm his fury: tiddlywinks.
• Her temper was legendary: she’d once slapped a stock boy for wearing odd socks.
• His next words made her fear for her life: “We’re out of peanut butter.”

Another, simpler, rule is to capitalize after a colon whenever it introduces a complete sentence:

• Her temper was legendary: She’d once slapped a stock boy for wearing odd socks.
• Only one thing could calm his fury: tiddlywinks.

Both rules are valid. Pick one and stick to it.

Capitalizing Lists

Capitalize the first words of vertical lists that are itemized with numbers, letters, bullets, etc.:

To hunt a Snark you will need

1. Thimbles
2. Forks
3. Railway shares
4. Soap

Non-itemized lists can be left in lower case.

My creative process comprises four activities:

sleeping
thinking
lolling
procrastinating

Computer Terms

Capital letters are often used for computer keys, menu options, and commands:

• Hit the Return key.
• Choose Print from the File menu.
• Click on the Save button.

The Name Game

Capitalize the names of people, places, groups and organizations, titles of rank, religions and their practitioners, days and months, historical periods, and brand names. Parts of this rule are flexible, and parts are not; a dictionary can be very helpful here. As always, be consistent.

Names of People

In addition to people’s names, terms used as names must also be capitalized:

• I enjoyed my date with the Headless Horseman, but his kisses were pumpkiny.

This includes personifications, which are abstract ideas (e.g., nature, death, fortune) behaving like people:

• When Death comes to fetch me, I’ll be hiding under the bed.

Some words may or may not be capitalized, depending on the context. If you can substitute Joe, then you need a capital letter:

• She told us Pa was in the shed wrestling the pigs.
• My pa is a champion pig-wrestler.
• Our mom dabbles in the occult.
• I’m getting Mom a crystal ball for her birthday.
• Of course, Aunt Millie wanted a cut of the action.
• She’s our greediest aunt.
• Her engines can’t take much more of this, Captain!
• The captain pushed the Enterprise as fast as its special effects would allow.

Names of Places

Capitalize the names of places, such as Timbuktu, the Deep South, and the Fertile Crescent. Directions are only capitalized when used in the name of a specific region:

• Ever since I saw Doctor Zhivago, I’ve wanted to live in the North.
• We travelled north until the yetis complained.
• I love the boneless attitude on the West Coast.
• He lives with two ferrets in a trailer on Mexico’s west coast.

Words like street, bridge, square, avenue, etc., are capitalized when they follow a name:

• The mime silently threw himself off Burrard Bridge.
• Many a puppeteer has made a fortune in New York City.
• The puppeting arts are well respected in the city of New York.

Titles of Rank

Capitalize a title if it comes before a name, but not if it comes after. If you can replace the title with Mr. or Ms., then it should be capitalized; otherwise, leave it in lower case:

• Send the plutonium to Director of Operations Sue Urquart.
• Sue Urquart is the director of operations for Terrorism Inc.
• I was named after President Nixon.
• The cleaning staff were fed up with the president’s slovenly habits.
• The army was led by Queen Zenobia.
• Zenobia was the queen of Palmyra.

However, the UK and Canada both write the Queen when referring to the current monarch. The US is more democratically lower-case.

Historical Periods

Capitalize historical periods with distinctive characteristics, such as the Dark Ages, the Renaissance, and the Roaring Twenties:

• During the Depression she made buttons with her teeth.
• Economists greeted the recent depression with smug pessimism.
• She dived head-first into the hedonism and drug abuse of the Sixties.
• He inherited a fortune in the fifties and had spent it all by the end of the sixties.

Brand Names

Brand names, or trade names, are capitalized until they become so common that the capital letters wear off with use. For example, Kleenex is capitalized but jeep is not. To know whether or not to capitalize a trade name, check a dictionary.

Verbs derived from trade names are not capitalized. If you use a Xerox machine, you are xeroxing.

Words Derived From Names

Someone from Quebec is a Quebecer; someone who follows Marx is a Marxist. However, a member of the Nazi Party believes in nazism, and someone reminiscent of Don Quixote is quixotic. There is no logic here; consult a dictionary.

Next week: Capitalizing titles of books, movies, Web sites, and more

Comma Chameleon

 

Comma vs. Tsunami

The uses of the comma are almost endless. (Or maybe it’s just my blog posts that seem endless.) Today I give you a grab bag of comma deployments, including introductory clauses, multiple adjectives, places, dates, and more. Dig in!

Introductory Phrases: The Big Tease

Some phrases beg the question, then what? When such a phrase is poised, oozing anticipation, before the subject of your sentence, corral it with a comma. (If you want to get grammatical, these phrases are dependent clauses, which start with if; adverbial phrases, which start with adverbs; and participial phrases, which start with participles.)

• If I told you the recipe, I’d have to kill you.
• After they all stumbled home at dawn, I sneaked into the kitchen and ate the leftover cake.
• Having recently lost his mind, the Duke was untroubled by anxiety over his missing schnauzer.

With short adverbial phrases the comma can be left out:

• On Tuesday I went mad.

If the phrase comes after the subject, you don’t need a comma…

• I’d have to kill you if I told you the recipe.
• I sneaked into the kitchen and ate the leftover cake after they all stumbled home at dawn.

…except when it’s a participial phrase:

• The Duke was untroubled by anxiety over his missing schnauzer, having recently lost his mind.
• The Duke, having recently lost his mind, was untroubled by anxiety over his missing schnauzer.

Adjective Conga Lines

When you have two or more adjectives describing the same word, put a comma between them:

• The demon made a dedicated, insinuating telemarketer.

But there are times when you don’t want to sprinkle commas in your adjective line:

• He always came to work wearing a bright red power tie.

How can you tell the difference? Try plopping the word and between adjectives. If it works, use a comma; if it doesn’t, don’t.

• The demon made a dedicated and insinuating telemarketer. (It works: insert comma.)
• He always came to work wearing a bright and red and power tie. (No, no, no. Skip the commas.)

Places and Dates

When place names have more than one part to them—for example, city and country—the second part needs commas on either side:

• She’s going to a philatelists’ convention in Gdansk, Poland, next month.
• Walla Walla, Washington, is only funny if you don’t live there.

The same principle applies to dates:

• The lovers met on Thursday, May 6, at the garbage dump.
• On June 23, 1982, I made a pact with Mephistopheles.

But certain date configurations don’t take commas. The British-style date (day, month, year) is comma-less. So is the month and year only, or a well-known holiday plus year:

• Mr. Bond and his attractive companion will land at the villain’s secret island lair on 12 August 1964.
• If all goes as planned, our new adopt-a-rodent program will be running by May 2010.
• New Year’s Day 2000 was a bit of a letdown for end-of-the-world enthusiasts.

Oh No You Don’t!

Introductory words such as yes, no, oh, and well should be followed by a comma:

• Yes, I do think it was tasteless of you to ask them about wife-swapping.
• Oh, I never feed the wolves after dark.
• No, you won’t like what you find in my basement.
• Well, I meant to bring dessert, but I got hungry on the way over.
• Man, these flashbacks are really distracting.

Unless, that is, they’re part of a common expression or informal phrase:

• Oh yeah?
• Oh my God.
• Oh no, not another apocalypse!
• No I won’t!
• Yes you will!

Also, a question contained inside a sentence can be set off by a comma:

• The question was, how many hotdogs would satisfy the Ogopogo?

Smoothing the Reader’s Way

Finally, the most important function of the comma is to clarify your meaning, so use one wherever it will keep your reader from becoming confused:

• She recognized the murderer as he rose from the table, and pointed a trembling finger. (Notice how this sentence’s meaning changes without the comma.)
• The fleas hopped in, in groups of three.

All these rules may seem a lot to wrap your head around, but a well-placed comma can make all the difference in your writing. Remember: If you’re good to the comma, the comma will be good to you.

Sideshow Commas

Girl With a Pearl Comma

Commas are grammar’s sheepdogs: they keep the various elements of a sentence from running off on their own and causing confusion and panic.

Commas on the Side

Commas are used to set apart non-essential pieces of your sentences. Words such as however and therefore need to be contained by a pair of commas to show that you’re interrupting your sentence with a bit of side business. Like an intermission, your aside may be interesting, but you don’t need it to understand the play.

• The Countess, however, refused to be seen in a Volkswagen.
• The chewing gum, therefore, was stuck to the ceiling.
• Many hobbies can be fulfilling, for example, stamp collecting, dental-floss macramé, and sugar-cube carving.
• The giant Madagascar hissing cockroach, I understand, makes a lovely companion.
• Kansas, she says, is the name of the star.
• The double-action shotgun, not diplomacy, was her forte.
• Quality food, including poutine, is best enjoyed after a night of heavy drinking.

This rule also applies when you’re addressing someone directly:

• Fernando, I don’t think you understand what this eggplant means to me.
• Grab a flamingo, everyone, and start playing!
• Dammit, Jim, I’m a doctor, not a go-go dancer!

Sometimes it’s not clear whether the phrase in question is side business or not. (This is when grammarians start throwing around the terms restrictive clause and nonrestrictive clause.) Take, for example, this sentence:

• My vampire, Duane, lives in the basement rec room.

This is fine if you only have one vampire; Duane can be removed from the sentence without changing its meaning. But what if you have a harem of vampires stashed in your house? You need the word Duane so your reader won’t think you’re talking about your other vampires, Joe, Hannah, and Billy Bob. When the phrase is needed to understand your sentence (that is, when it’s a restrictive clause), don’t use commas.

• My vampire Duane lives in the basement rec room. (I have multiple vampires.)
• My romance novel, Scottish Lords with Bulging Calf Muscles, is a real bodice-ripper. (This is my only romance novel. Take out the title and the sentence says the same thing.)
• My romance novel Scottish Lords with Bulging Calf Muscles is a real bodice-ripper. (I have written other romance novels, some of which feature other kinds of lords with different muscles. Remove the title and you won’t know which bodice-ripper I’m talking about.)
• She carried the shotgun not so much to shoot people as to scare them witless.
• If you insist on wandering in the woods during the full moon and are therefore bitten by a werewolf, don’t expect sympathy from me.

Sometimes grammarians talk about the that/which rule. This rule decrees that only necessary (restrictive) clauses use the word that, and only side business (nonrestrictive) clauses use the word which.

• The aliens that invaded my bathtub have used all the soap. (Not to be confused with the aliens in my pantry.)
• The alien craft, which landed on Tuesday, makes a striking lawn ornament. (Only one alien craft has ever landed in these parts.)

Of course, the British blithely ignore the that/which rule and use which whenever they damn well please. You can too, as long as you’re consistent.

Next week: commas and phrases and clauses, oh my!

Commas, Commas Everywhere

 

The Mystical, Magical Comma

Like the Martha Stewarts of grammar, commas keep your sentences organized. Sometimes commas are optional, but there are times when you must use them or risk looking ignorant or gauche. So dust off your tux, straighten your moustache, and follow me into the Casino Royale of comma rules.

Commas and Conjunctions: Like Pancakes and Maple Syrup

Use a comma before a conjunction. What’s a conjunction? It’s a word like and, but, or yet that joins two sections of a sentence the way a hitch joins two train cars.

• I’ve trained the squirrels outside my window to do back flips and pyramids, and we’ll be taking our act on the road next week.
• He bought the jester’s costume and the floppy hat, but I can’t help feeling his heart isn’t in it.

If a sentence is short and its parts are closely related, you can leave out the comma:

• I dropped her off at the racetrack and I haven’t seen her since.

Whatever you do, don’t stick a comma in your sentence instead of a conjunction. It simply can’t take the weight, and your sentence will go off the rails:

• I’m going as a cephalopod, I’ve already bought the suction cups.

The above comma needs to be either helped by a conjunction or replaced by a semicolon, which is stronger than a comma:

• I’m going as a cephalopod, and I’ve already bought the suction cups.
• I’m going as a cephalopod; I’ve already bought the suction cups.

Or if you’re a Hemingway-esque writer who likes ’em short and choppy, you can divide your sentence into two:

• I’m going as a cephalopod. I’ve already bought the suction cups.

Try not to get overexcited and slap a comma in front of every and or but you see. Conjunctions can be sneaky, and sometimes you’ll find them playing different roles. They don’t need commas when they’re not acting as hitches. Consider the following sentence:

• I wanted to go to the orgy but couldn’t find any whipping cream.

The second train car (“couldn’t find any whipping cream”) doesn’t have a subject—without the first car we don’t know who was at a loss for dairy products. The I from the first part is doing double duty for both verbs, wanted and couldn’t, which makes this one train car, not two (or a compound predicate if you want to get technical).

• I wanted to go to the orgy, but I couldn’t find any whipping cream.

In this case we have two subjects and two verbs, which means we have two train cars (or independent clauses) joined by a hitch. As such, this but can take a comma (although the sentence is short enough to go without one if you wish).

Lists: Keeping Things in Line

When your sentence has a list of three or more, use commas to keep them separated and avoid fights:

• According to The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, the ingredients for a Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster include Ol’ Janx Spirit, seawater from Santraginus V, Arcturan mega-gin, Fallian marsh gas, Qualactin hypermint extract, the tooth of an Algolian suntiger, zamphour, and an olive.
• A mouse, a duck, a dodo, a lory, an eaglet, and several other curious creatures ended up in the pool of tears with Alice.

You’ll notice both these sentences have a comma before the final and. This is called a serial comma (like a serial killer, only nicer) and it is completely optional. Whether you decide to use it or not use it, be consistent. Dropping or adding it halfway through your writing makes you look either sloppy or just plain confused.

Grammar’s Romeo and Juliet

Avoid the mysteriously common error of putting a comma between the subject and the verb:

• People who live in glass houses, shouldn’t clean in the buff.

The subject (people) and verb (shouldn’t) are like lovers who long to be together. It would be wrong to come between them.

• People who live in glass houses shouldn’t clean in the buff.
  
  

Next week: sideshow commas, the that/which rule, vampires, and go-go dancers.

The Literal Truth

Some people (you know who you are) use the word literally all wrong. They trot it out to add oomph to their pronouncements, not realizing it was born for a completely different role. To say you mean something literally is to swear off metaphors, figures of speech, exaggerations, and other flights of fancy. You’re declaring that you mean exactly what you say—no more, no less.

If you complain that you’re literally starving, then your body has begun to consume its internal organs. If you announce that you’re literally walking on air, expect a visit from the Department of Defence. Literally asks for your words to be taken at face value, as if read by an unimaginative robot. It’s a highly specialized word, and the only time you’re likely to need it is when your reader might think you’re being fanciful and you want to assure them you’re not:

• At the height of her anorexia disorder, she was literally starving herself to death.
• Without evildoers to catch, Spiderman found himself literally climbing the walls with boredom.
• My boss shouted himself into such a rage he was literally foaming at the mouth; some of us were hit by flying spittle.

When you find yourself about to pull out literally, think twice. Maybe you meant to reach for its cousin totally instead. A careful use of literally will save you the embarrassment of describing yourself as literally boiling mad (you’re a lobster?) or literally dead on your feet (you’re a zombie) or literally shit-faced (doesn’t bear thinking about).

Apostrophes and How to Use ’Em

 

The Divine Apostrophe

Few punctuation marks are as abused as the blameless apostrophe. The better you understand its job, the less likely you are to do the little critter harm.

Possession: The Apostrophe’s Favourite Pastime

Apostrophes often show possession or ownership:

• The science project’s effects were unforeseen and world-altering. (The effects belong to the science project.)
• Satan’s cheerleaders have set fire to the auditorium. (The cheerleaders belong to Satan.)

When the owner is plural, the apostrophe dangles after the s like the severed ear in Blue Velvet:

• The hippies’ bus is parked on our lawn.
• The aliens’ spaceships are a fetching shade of pink.

But don’t make the mistake of giving the David Lynch treatment to plural owners that don’t end in s. They can be treated the same as singular owners:

• The children’s pyromaniacal tendencies…
• The men’s feather boas…
• The sheep’s plans for world domination…

And what about singular owners that end in s? Opinion is divided. Americans like the simpler, apostrophe-only method:

• the cactus’ spines
• David Sedaris’ stories

The Brits, on the other hand, prefer the full Monty:

• Tom Jones’s knickers
• Prince Charles’s ears

If you decide to go the British route, you should know that because of tradition or weird pronunciation certain names take only an apostrophe:

• Jesus’ sandals
• Moses’ beard
• Achilles’ heel

If you’re not sure, say the word out loud—if you don’t pronounce the extra s, you don’t need to write it (as in the expression for goodness’ sake).

Finally, be warned that the possessive forms of pronouns (those promiscuous little words than can be used for any person or thing) do not take apostrophes:

• his
• hers
• its
• ours
• theirs
• whose

You wouldn’t stick an apostrophe in these any more than you would in my or mine.

Contractions: C’mon and Squeeze Me, Baby

The ’em in this post’s title is a shorter version of them (like ’cause and because); its beginning was amputated like a gangrenous limb and an apostrophe was put in its place to show something had been removed. Similarly, contractions are words in which some of the letters have been squeezed out and replaced with apostrophes:

• what’s = what is
• wouldn’t = would not
• can’t = cannot
• let’s = let us

Some contractions are the source of considerable confusion and hair-pulling, namely

• it’s = it is (or it has)
• who’s = who is (or who has)
• you’re = you are
• they’re = they are
  

Their doppelgangers – its, whose, your, and their – are all possessive pronouns, like my and mine, and don’t take apostrophes.

It’s vs. Its: The Cheat Sheet

If you’re not sure which word to use, try plugging in it is (for it’s) or his (for its) and see which works best.

Example: It’s an ill wind that blows its nose in your direction.

• It is an ill wind that blows his nose in your direction. (Makes reasonable sense)
• His an ill wind that blows it is nose in your direction. (Total gibberish)

The example sentence is correct.

Example: Who’s the idiot whose car is at the bottom of my swimming pool?

• Who is the idiot his car is at the bottom of my swimming pool? (Kind of makes sense)
• His the idiot who is car is at the bottom of my swimming pool? (Not so much)

Example: You’re not giving them your best sharkskin suit!

• You are not giving them his best sharkskin suit! (Reasonable)
• His not giving them you are best sharkskin suit! (Horsepuckies)

Here are a few more examples:

• What a long, strange trip it’s been. (it has been)
• Whose brownies did you eat? (his brownies)
• She’s a girl who’s got her heart in the right place. (who has got)
• Unfortunately, she’s also a girl whose heart likes to step out once in a while. (her heart likes)
• I’ll tell them you’re swimming with the dolphins. (you are swimming)
• The slimy alien wants its teddy bear. (his teddy bear)
• They’re spending this weekend preparing for the zombie apocalypse. (they are spending)

Advanced Confusions

Grammarians used to urge us to put apostrophes in plurals that contained numbers or capital letters, but that usage has since fallen out of fashion and you can now go with the cleaner-looking 1920s and DVDs. But there are a few situations where you might want to stick in an apostrophe to keep your reader from getting confused:

• cross your i’s and dot your t’s
• a report card of A’s and B’s

The point of all this punctuation is, after all, to make your reader’s work as easy as possible. The clearer your meaning, the more convincing your argument.

(A version of this article was originally published at Suite101.com.)